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Language games and tragedy: the Bristol Royal Infirmary disaster revisited.

Actors in health organizations often participate in language games which encompass clinical, professional, and organizational subject matter. Such language games intersect within the hospital environment. This paper appraises issues of clinical risk through the re-examination of the language games w...

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Published in:Health, Risk & Society Vol. 8; no. 4; pp. 359 - 378
Main Author: Kewell BJ
Format: research Journal Article
Published: Taylor & Francis Ltd Dec2006
Online Access:View this record in EBSCOhost
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      dt: Dec2006
      vid: 8
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      pub: Taylor & Francis Ltd
      place: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
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        atl: Language games and tragedy: the Bristol Royal Infirmary disaster revisited.
      aug:
        au: Kewell BJ
        affil: Lecturer in Public Sector Management, York Management School, Block A, Sally Baldwin Buildings, Heslington Campus, The University of York, York Y010 5DD, UK
      sug:
        subj:
          Communication
          Hospitals United Kingdom
          Language
          Patient Safety
          Grounded Theory
          Cardiac Surgery
          Narratives
          Quality of Health Care
          United Kingdom
          Human
      ab: Actors in health organizations often participate in language games which encompass clinical, professional, and organizational subject matter. Such language games intersect within the hospital environment. This paper appraises issues of clinical risk through the re-examination of the language games which formed a part of one of Britain's worst medical disasters, namely the Bristol Royal Infirmary tragedy. A textual, grounded analysis of transcripts from the oral hearings of the 'Bristol Inquiry' (n = 74) provides the paper with a qualitative dataset, within which medical language games are analysed. The paper concludes that clinical actors work within discourses of risk (McDonald et al. 2005) that are partly constructed within, and by, participation in language games (Wittgenstein 1953). In the case of the Bristol Royal Infirmary tragedy, these games manifested contrasting interpretations of risk and safety which reflected a tainted interpretation of data by different parties at different times of the unfolding tragedy. Sensemaking of reputation appears to have played an important part in the construction of these interpretations of risk.
      pubtype: Academic Journal
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        research
        Journal Article
      ougenre: Article
    language: English
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